1 Piastra - Ferdinando I

Ferdinando I de' Medici struck this piastra within months of an extraordinary personal pivot: he was a cardinal when his brother Francesco died in October 1587, and he renounced his ecclesiastical rank — highly unusual for someone of his standing — to assume the grand duchy. These first coins of his reign were therefore issued by a man who had shed the purple of Rome for secular rule in Florence. The Florentine mint, the Zecca, moved quickly to establish his authority in silver.

The MIR 201/1 designation marks this as the first die pairing of the type, distinguished from subsequent emissions by subtle differences in the lettering spacing documented by Toderi and Vannel.